Why Hope lives

My daughter was a little upset when I told her the character of Hope in The Pandora Chronicles is not based on her. (I'm using her as inspiration for another short-story series I'm working on, though.)

Photo of Mia Wasikowska
from the Orlando Sentinel

I've found it helpful to picture an actual person when writing this character. In my mind, she resembles the actresses Mia Wasikowska or Saoirse Ronan. Her emotional state is, I try to convey, precarious. In the second story, called "The Breaking," we see how the plagues have affected Hope and, by extension, everyone else: Jake, Flex, Michael, Hope's mother and other characters to come. While the plagues are almost considered normal occurrences by now, they continue take a toll on those who remain alive, creating a mass emotional state that also is considered normal -- one of perpetual grief, trauma, PTSD and fear.

Hope fights against all of that, even as she recognizes, slowly but surely, that something inside her is broken. Still, she continues to move forward to find answers, no matter what the cost. She doesn't always understand why she's doing it, either -- just that she must.

The question now is, who doesn't want her to know those answers? And why?